SoMe, SEO/SEM, Mobile: Measurement Required

Whether your company or client is engaging in social media, mobile or SEO, or waiting to see if the fad becomes a business model (which at this point means you’ve missed the boat), measurement is key. I’ve commented many times before that no matter what tactics you use, strategies haven’t changed since the birth of marketing. Some new figures released by the 2009 B2B Vertical Search Report back that up.

• 47% of respondents are more likely than last year to be using widgets (desktop or in-browser) that provide customized internet marketing and business information, compared to 35% of internet marketing professionals a year ago
• More than half of survey respondents report that their businesses are using SaaS for email (77%), web hosting (74%), sales and marketing (62%), CMS (59%), file and assets storage (57%), search (57%) and ad serving (51%)

Many businesses are increasing some of their ad spend:

• 78% of advertisers are planning to raise their spending on CPA (cost-per-action/acquisition) formats this year
• 67% plan to increase spending on cost-per-lead (CPL) ads
• Just under half will increase spending on cost-per-click (CPC)
• 29% say that their spending on CPM (cost-per-mille /online display advertising) will increase this year

Most are using the information, specifically concerning search, to their benefit:

• 53% of publishers surveyed incorporate “basic” search site features on their site, compared with 41% who have integrated “more sophisticated” search tools
• 6% have no site search features on their website at all
• 37% of publishers use in-house technology for site search
• 22% use search embedded within the content management system
• 17% use licensed technology
• 15% use freeware such as open source technology
• 33% of publishers surveyed offer the ability to search third-party content from their website
• 18% of publishers are planning to implement this in the future
• 91% of publishers surveyed make use of search log analytics
• 28% refer to search logs frequently
• 36% say they derive strategic value from search log analytics
• 26% of internet marketing professionals use their mobile/cell phone for searching at least once a day, and 18% use their mobile device for a work-related search at least daily
• 75% of respondents say that the quality of the mobile search experience is average or poor, compared to only 25% who say that it is excellent or good

The upshot of this is that measurement is key. There is already a great deal about the measureability of social media. SEO and SEM have been around much longer, this explains the plethora of measurement tools available. It also explains their waining effectiveness and cost. As those of us who do social media marketing for a living work out the best practices, more tools for measurement will become available. Expect to see an explosion of tools such as TRAACKR to be popping up through the course of 2009.